Use these meal plans to get an idea of what eating a keto diet looks like. Evaluate each day's meals and think about whether or not the foods look palatable and if the eating style seems manageable. If you decide that you think you'd like to try the eating style, connect with a nutrition or medical professional to create a plan that is personalized for you.
A computer program such as KetoCalculator may be used to help generate recipes.[46] The meals often have four components: heavy whipping cream, a protein-rich food (typically meat), a fruit or vegetable and a fat such as butter, vegetable oil or mayonnaise. Only low-carbohydrate fruits and vegetables are allowed, which excludes bananas, potatoes, peas and corn. Suitable fruits are divided into two groups based on the amount of carbohydrate they contain, and vegetables are similarly divided into two groups. Foods within each of these four groups may be freely substituted to allow for variation without needing to recalculate portion sizes. For example, cooked broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower and green beans are all equivalent. Fresh, canned or frozen foods are equivalent, but raw and cooked vegetables differ, and processed foods are an additional complication. Parents are required to be precise when measuring food quantities on an electronic scale accurate to 1 g. The child must eat the whole meal and cannot have extra portions; any snacks must be incorporated into the meal plan. A small amount of MCT oil may be used to help with constipation or to increase ketosis.[36]
People can’t stop talking about the ketogenic diet, and social media is filled with photos and posts from people who credit this high-fat, low-carb plan for their significant weight loss. If you're interested in giving keto a try, consult your doctor first—and then test it out by swapping your usual go-to snack for a keto version. These blogger- and nutritionist-inspired snack recipes are the ones we’ve been seeing all over Pinterest.
When you consume lots of sugar and have higher levels of insulin on a continuing basis, your cells try to protect you and eventually start resisting or ignoring insulin. Remember, insulin is the key that allows glucose into the cell. So, your cells prevent insulin from working in order to prevent excessive sugar in the cell. This is your body saying, “If you’re going to keep eating sugar, I will block it at the cellular level.”
Ketones are triggered by an absence of carbohydrates and sugar. There are specific steps to take to get your body into ketosis, but essentially, when carbohydrates are eliminated, the body will transfer over to using ketones. But I don’t recommend removing carbohydrates completely because I want you to be consuming lots of vegetables. One reason it is so crucial to take in lots of vegetables, and especially lots of vegetables high in potassium, such as kale, beet greens and collard greens, is because it will help you keep all this fat you’re dumping off the body off your liver. You can get a fatty liver when you start dropping lots of weight, as you will once you begin running on ketones instead of glucose. So think VEGETABLE CARBOHYDRATE ONLY.
Raw Coconut Butter — This is made from blended coconut meat, and provides us with a delicious way to get plenty of coconut fat without missing out on our favorite coconut flavors. Make sure the coconut butter you find has no added sugar — and, most importantly, don’t overdo it. Coconut butter is packed with calories which can slow your weight loss.
The main criticisms include fears about fat intake and the process of ketosis.The argument over whether saturated fats are unhealthy has been settled in the research literature (they are not). If you need more info, there are several good books to read on this subject. For more information about the type of fats to eat, see the saturated vs unsaturated fats page. The right side column on that page has books which provide more information.
You’ve probably heard about the low carb, high fat diet that’s so popular among actors and models, and with good reason: low carb diets offer proper nourishment with whole foods, while keeping your body burning fat for fuel. This is a great way to be, as it makes fat loss largely effortless! But where does this “ketogenic” word fit into the picture?

This two-day keto meal plan comes from a registered dietitian who prescribes the diet for clients who are looking to reach a variety of health goals. Pegah Jalali, MS, RD, CDN, is an adjunct professor at New York University, works at the NYU Langone Comprehensive Epilepsy Center, and is a private practice dietitian at Middleberg Nutrition, a New York City health and wellness practice.

A computer program such as KetoCalculator may be used to help generate recipes.[46] The meals often have four components: heavy whipping cream, a protein-rich food (typically meat), a fruit or vegetable and a fat such as butter, vegetable oil or mayonnaise. Only low-carbohydrate fruits and vegetables are allowed, which excludes bananas, potatoes, peas and corn. Suitable fruits are divided into two groups based on the amount of carbohydrate they contain, and vegetables are similarly divided into two groups. Foods within each of these four groups may be freely substituted to allow for variation without needing to recalculate portion sizes. For example, cooked broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cauliflower and green beans are all equivalent. Fresh, canned or frozen foods are equivalent, but raw and cooked vegetables differ, and processed foods are an additional complication. Parents are required to be precise when measuring food quantities on an electronic scale accurate to 1 g. The child must eat the whole meal and cannot have extra portions; any snacks must be incorporated into the meal plan. A small amount of MCT oil may be used to help with constipation or to increase ketosis.[36]

In the worst form of diabetes (type 1), a condition called ketoacidosis can exist. This is completely different from ketosis. Ketoacidosis is a disease state where there is no more insulin and acids build up to high levels that are dangerous to one's health. But with ketosis, the pH in the body doesn't even get close to the high levels seen with ketoacidosis.

The ketogenic diet—also known as "keto"—has become the latest big thing in weight-loss plans, touted recently by celebs like Jenna Jameson, Mama June, and Halle Berry. The diet involves cutting way back on carbohydrates, to 50 grams a day or less, to help the body achieve a state of ketosis, in which it has to burn fat (rather than sugar) for energy.
Wilder's colleague, paediatrician Mynie Gustav Peterman, later formulated the classic diet, with a ratio of one gram of protein per kilogram of body weight in children, 10–15 g of carbohydrate per day, and the remainder of calories from fat. Peterman's work in the 1920s established the techniques for induction and maintenance of the diet. Peterman documented positive effects (improved alertness, behaviour and sleep) and adverse effects (nausea and vomiting due to excess ketosis). The diet proved to be very successful in children: Peterman reported in 1925 that 95% of 37 young patients had improved seizure control on the diet and 60% became seizure-free. By 1930, the diet had also been studied in 100 teenagers and adults. Clifford Joseph Barborka, Sr., also from the Mayo Clinic, reported that 56% of those older patients improved on the diet and 12% became seizure-free. Although the adult results are similar to modern studies of children, they did not compare as well to contemporary studies. Barborka concluded that adults were least likely to benefit from the diet, and the use of the ketogenic diet in adults was not studied again until 1999.[10][14]
Lots of apps and website offer keto diet challenges—basically, a blueprint for the keto diet with a fixed starting and ending point (they typically last for a week to a month, though some may be longer). Speaking of apps, plenty of keto-centric ones are right at your fingertips (a.k.a., your smartphone), like the KetoDiet app, which can help you calculate your macros and track your keto diet effectively.

I LOVE Urban Remedy, but as another review said, this plan is my least favorite and I will not order again. First of all, the stevia in the drinks makes me super bloated and they just taste sickly sweet and like stevia. I feel like a cleanse should train your palate away from sweetness. In addition, the meals are just too repetitive, and I found the salmon and chicken to be very bland and unappetizing. Could this not be more varied? Maybe some sardines, tuna? Finally, through NO fault of Urban Remedy, this plan made me realize I had an egg allergy.

Lemon juice contains citrates (the substance that gives citrus fruits their sour taste). When you’re low on citrates, you’re at risk for kidney stones. Add the lemon juice to your kale shake or drink it in water. Try to consume at least one lemon per day (lemon juice or the fruit of the lemon).34 I also recommend taking my electrolyte mix because it contains minerals in their citric form, as in potassium citrate, helping to bind oxalate stones and neutralize uric-acid stones.35,36
A question we frequently get asked is whether you have to defrost boneless, skinless chicken breasts before making this recipe, or if you can just use them frozen. If you forgot to pull the chicken out of the freezer in the morning, we have good news for you! Crack Chicken can easily be made with frozen chicken. If using an Instant Pot, just add 5 minutes on to the cooking time (for a total of 20 minutes on Manual High Pressure).
Yvette, Oh no, sorry to hear about the chicken not being cooked! Was the chicken frozen to start with? If so, be sure to add 5 minutes to your Instant Pot cooking time (on manual high pressure). When we tested this, we literally just put everything into the IP (nestled down into the liquid, of course), and let it do its thing. The cream cheese softened, and when it was done cooking we removed the chicken to shred it, and the sauce stirred together nicely.
If you haven't heard of biltong, they're those thick, flavorful strips of air-dried meat that put stringy, chewy, and additive-packed beef jerky to shame. These peppery little slabs are made from grass-fed beef, air-dried for 14 days, and spiced with a blend of cayenne and chili powder to add some heat without overwhelming your palate. They’re also sugar-free, full of protein, and super simple to toss in your bag.
In regimented keto diets, only 10% of total calories per day (about a measly 20 grams!) come from carbs, 20% from protein, and a whopping 70% from fats. Since our bodies preferentially use carbs for energy, cutting them means we have to use something else to keep organs functioning. Our bodies then turn to the glucose stored in our muscles as glycogen for fuel.
The beauty of salmon is that you can cook it with marginal interference. A simple sauce of butter, lemon juice, chopped garlic, and some salt and pepper will go a long way to enhancing the natural flavor of the salmon. Drizzle the sauce over 4-6 oz portions of fish, bake at 450F for 5 minutes per 1/2″ thickness of fish. In another bowl, toss the asparagus with olive oil, salt, and pepper, spread it out evenly on a cookie sheet, and roast in the oven at 450 for 20 minutes. Easy dinner (with leftovers if you plan ahead) that’s full of nutrition, protein, and healthy fat, while keeping your carbs low. Get the recipe and instructions
You may also be a great candidate for the Keto diet if you experience migraines, joint pain, muscle weakness or mental fatigue. In addition, "Keto diet can be beneficial for mental health conditions like depression, autism and Alzheimer's". Other than that, "you can also follow this diet plan if you're trying to get pregnant since it improves fertility", she notes.
Wow!! This was sooo good! Tried another crack chicken recipe with a ranch packet and had to throw away the leftovers…no one would eat them. This, however is much better!! Didn’t change recipe other than use pre cooked bacon that I cut up. Probably would be better with the grease involved, however, this is AWESOME!! Also, my chicken tenders were still 3/4 frozen and I didn’t adjust time. They were just fine. Thanks for sharing!! A def do over say myself, hubby, and kids!!!

When you eat tons of carbs, your blood sugar is consistently elevated, and then so is insulin. Insulin is a hormone that keeps your blood sugar in check by shuttling the glucose into cells, but when there’s a consistently high amount of insulin, your cells become resistant. This insulin resistance makes it easier to store fat, and chronically high levels of insulin also cause excessive inflammation in the body, which contributes to heart disease, high blood pressure, and potentially type 2 diabetes.

Switching to a ketogenic diet plan can be uncomfortable at first because your body metabolism is refitting itself to burn fat instead of relying on glucose. However, you can avoid most of the symptoms. Here's a list of all of the common side effects that will happen the first week or so of starting a ketogenic diet. Knowing about them allows you to take steps to minimize them, and save yourself some carb withdrawal misery. Dr. Mike Eades has a great analogy for this process in this blog post. I highly recommend you read it.
A systematic review in 2018 looked at sixteen studies on the ketogenic diet in adults. It concluded that the treatment was becoming more popular for that group of patients, that the efficacy in adults was similar to children, the side effects relatively mild. However, many patients gave up with the diet, for various reasons, and the quality of evidence inferior to studies on children. Health issues include high levels of low-density lipoprotein (LDL), high total cholesterol, and weight loss.[23]
How often you eat is also up to your personal preference. "For most people, I recommend three to four meals per day with a few healthy keto snacks in between," says Dr. Axe. "This ensures that you're getting a good mix of protein and fat all day long to keep you feeling energized and satisfied." That being said, he encourages people to listen to their bodies and tune in to when they're truly hungry. "If you find that you feel better eating five to six smaller meals spread throughout the day, do what works best for you."
What about fruits and vegetables? All fruits are rich in carbs, but you can have certain fruits (usually berries) in small portions. Vegetables (also rich in carbs) are restricted to leafy greens (such as kale, Swiss chard, spinach), cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, asparagus, bell peppers, onions, garlic, mushrooms, cucumber, celery, and summer squashes. A cup of chopped broccoli has about six carbs.

Health.com is part of the Meredith Health Group. All rights reserved. The material in this site is intended to be of general informational use and is not intended to constitute medical advice, probable diagnosis, or recommended treatments. All products and services featured are selected by our editors. Health.com may receive compensation for some links to products and services on this website. Offers may be subject to change without notice. See the Terms of Service and Privacy Policy (Your California Rights)for more information. Ad Choices | EU Data Subject Requests

Meal prepping is the secret to eating on a tight budget. It allows you to buy the items that are on sale, in bulk, and prepare them for quick access throughout the week. The meal prep detailed here took us about 2 hours of “active time” and another 3 hours of “passive time”. The passive time was mostly waiting for the chicken to cook/cool. The items we prepped for this meal plan are:
Ketogenic diets are very, very powerful, metabolically speaking and this is especially important if you take any kind of medication for blood pressure, diabetes, cholesterol or triglycerides. The amount taken of these medications will most likely need to be sharply reduced while on a ketogenic diet to avoid negative effects such as excessively low blood sugar or blood pressure.
The first signs of ketosis are known as the “keto flu” where headaches, brain fogginess, fatigue, and the like can really rile your body up. Make sure that you’re drinking plenty of waterand eating plenty of salt. The ketogenic diet is a natural diuretic and you’ll be peeing more than normal. Take into account that you’re peeing out electrolytes, and you can guess that you’ll be having a thumping headache in no time. Keeping your salt intake and water intake high enough is very important, allowing your body to re-hydrate and re-supply your electrolytes. Doing this will help with the headaches, if not get rid of them completely.
As a result of those satiating fats required by the ketogenic diet, you may find you’re not craving snacks as much as you usually do. “I find people who follow the ketogenic diet, they’re just not as hungry, so their snack frequency comes down,” says Dina Griffin, RDN, with eNRG Performance in Littleton, Colorado. “There’s just so much fat in their diet, so they say, ‘I don’t want to eat again,’ or ‘I can’t, I’m just not hungry.’”
When we devised this keto on a budget meal plan and shopping list we wanted to create something that was truly all-inclusive. Therefor we have things like butter and salad dressing included. Most people will have a lot of the basics already in their kitchen, so you could be pulling this plan off for well under $5 a day. Further down in this post we will talk about possible substitutions you could utilize to make this plan even healthier and cheaper with bulk purchases of a few items you’ll be using frequently on your keto journy!
Think about any social situations that will be encountered, and devise ways to handle those times when temptations to eat the "old" way will be high. You don't want to be blind sided when someone at the office brings in a box of your favorite chocolates and puts them right under your nose. Likewise, a beer with your friends usually turns into a date with potato skins and nachos. Think salad and steak instead.
Not only is this jerky zero-carb, sugar-free, and full of protein, but Davidson says it's the perfect keto post-workout recovery snack, especially since protein is crucial in building and repairing muscles after exercise. (P.S. This is what you need to know about exercising on the keto diet.) And since jerky is harder to eat and chew, it allows time for your stomach to tell your brain you're full, keeping those pesky carb cravings at bay, she says.
I have the same calories limit and macro. I easily stay within the limit but I completely stopped eating any type of bread, pasta, rice, potatoes and starchy food. I started using butter or coconut oil to cook and put mayo EVERYWHERE. It’s my new favourite topping for lettuce even XD. Then I eat plenty of eggs/meat/fatty fish and cheese. Olives are great as a snack. I cut out completely milk and use whipping cream instead. If you get into this completely counter intuitive way of thinking of food it’s super easy to get enough fat within the calorie limit.
We all know fat is more filling than carbs, but every now and then you get a hankering for something to snack on and you NEED some low carb snacks. Whether it’s salty, sweet or frosty, we all need a moment to enjoy something in between meals. Being on a diet shouldn’t mean all snacks are thrown out the window, being on a diet means learning what your body needs and how to best provide for it. If your body is craving something salty, there are ways of indulging without setting yourself back. There are ways of eating even brownies and cakes that won’t undo all your progress.

Hi Stacey, I can’t give medical advice and definitely recommend following your doctor’s recommendations. You can ask him/her if low carb would be better suited for you. Also, you may want to double check with him/her if the kidney concern was related to high protein, because that is a common misconception about keto – it is not a high protein diet/lifestyle.
Fillenworth suggests Brami beans as a great snack for keto dieters, especially since most legumes tend to be too high in carbohydrates. With only 60 calories, 2 grams of fiber, and a whopping 7 grams of protein per 25 beans, these Brami beans are an excellent way to boost protein intake (especially if you need a break from meat). (Related: Is a Vegetarian Keto Diet Healthy?)
When you eat a ketogenic diet, you switch your body’s fuel source to fat rather than the body’s usual source, glucose (1). From this fuel source switch, the hunger hormone, Ghrelin, is reduced which causes your appetite to decrease (1). Because of the reduction in appetite, it is easier to adopt an intermittent fasting approach or an approach that lessons unwanted eating behavior outside your desired hours (AKA curbs the late night munchies). Therefore, I recommend eating 4 bigger meals rather than 6 small meals on a Ketogenic Meal Plan.
That’s why many health experts are concerned about people on the keto diet, especially those who try it without the guidance of a doctor or nutritionist. Doctors say that high-fat diets like this one may raise cholesterol levels, and some studies suggest that they increase the risk of diabetes. Some have even called it a “cardiologist’s nightmare.”

I have the same calories limit and macro. I easily stay within the limit but I completely stopped eating any type of bread, pasta, rice, potatoes and starchy food. I started using butter or coconut oil to cook and put mayo EVERYWHERE. It’s my new favourite topping for lettuce even XD. Then I eat plenty of eggs/meat/fatty fish and cheese. Olives are great as a snack. I cut out completely milk and use whipping cream instead. If you get into this completely counter intuitive way of thinking of food it’s super easy to get enough fat within the calorie limit.

In contrast, multivitamins aren’t a good solution as they are synthetic and lack a lot of nutrients like polyphenols, antioxidants and fiber that green powders and whole food sources provide. And the lack of fats and enzymes make the nutrients they do contain very difficult to process properly. Just because you’re putting something in your body doesn’t mean your body can use it.
I wanted to put it out there that I made this meal plan specifically with women in mind. I took an average of about 150 women and what their macros were. The end result was 1600 calories – broken down into 136g of fat, 74g of protein, and 20g net carbs a day. This is all built around a sedentary lifestyle, like most of us live. If you need to increase or decrease calories, you will need to do that on your own terms.
But when you look at long-term results, there is very little difference between the two. 'Part of this is because adherence is very poor for low-carb diets in the long term – that is, people find it difficult to maintain a very low-carb diet, which suggests it's probably not sustainable to continue eating this way in the long-term,' says Dr Barclay.
But first a little legal and medical coverage: Although I have a Master's degree in Applied Clinical Nutrition, I am not a physician. I do have extensive experience with eating the ketogenic way, and I cured my health problems with a ketogenic diet. I am not guaranteeing that this diet will work for you or cure your health problems. I am just sharing what I know about ketogenic diets. Click here for the full legal disclaimer.
Bread probably isn’t the first thing that comes to mind when you think about the ketogenic diet because it’s generally full of carbs. But, if you replace your store-bought bread with a homemade keto bread recipe, it can fit seamlessly into your keto low-carb, high-fat diet. How does bread even become keto-friendly? With almond flour, a lot of eggs, cream of tartar, butter, baking soda and apple cider vinegar.
Another common mistake that she sees is that people focus too much on macronutrients: "Micronutrients are really important too as ketosis is metabolically demanding and the diet is not nutritionally adequate most of the time." She says that most of her clients take multivitamins, carnitine supplements, calcium supplements and sometimes selenium or zinc.
Probably, and there are a few reasons why, Keatley says. For starters, people usually reduce their daily caloric intake to about 1,500 calories a day because healthy fats and lean proteins make you feel fuller sooner—and for a longer period of time. And then there’s the fact that it takes more energy to process and burn fat and protein than carbs, so you're burning slightly more calories than you did before. Over time, this can lead to weight loss.